A number of attempts have been made in the past to use natural materials as polymeric building blocks. These have included producing “hybrid” copolymers comprising natural materials (e.g., sugars and starches) polymerized with synthetic monomers using chain transfer techniques, such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,666,963, and PCT Publication No. WO 2011/014783.
The synthetic portions of these hybrid copolymers are made up of mixtures of the synthetic monomers if more than one monomer is used. This leads to the formation of synthetic chains in the hybrid copolymer that have a blend of properties of the two monomers, which has been found to not take full advantage of the functionality of both monomer moieties. Accordingly, there is a need to product copolymers or copolymer compositions that can maximize the performance obtained from these monomer moieties.